Monochrome My Madness

by Ashleigh Giannoccaro

  I bend down to her so she can hear me. “Uncle Callum is here to fix it now sweetheart.” She smiles at me so big and twists her pigtail in her fingers. “I know; my mommy is going to go now.” She wipes a stray tear and bounds down the hill to where the Callum rests his hand on his friend's shoulder. Callum is home, I wonder if I will ever find a home. The little girl makes me uncomfortable, her innocence is more than I can stand.

  I walk slowly behind her and stand a few steps away as the two men stand. I see the bloody knife and photo on the floor between them and I lunge forward to grab Avery’s hand but I am too slow. She sees it all. Her little eyes look up at the two men and she beams at Callum. “You killed the devil.” My heart just splinters, she is already a monster. I feel sorry for the little girl who will end up just like all of us. Why do I feel for her? No one felt for me. How is that sweet little angel already one of us?

  Callum smiles down at her and Rowan puts his big hand on her little shoulder, his hands and arms are completely covered in tattoos and it looks wrong against her innocent, clean baby skin. “Yes he did baby, yes he did. Come, let’s go home.”

  Rowan picks the little girl up and kisses her. When he puts her down he turns to see me standing there, his expression falls, yes I am her ghost. I know he just sees Cassie. He whispers loudly, “Cassie.”

  Callum reaches for me and pulls me closer. “No, Rowan. Shannon – my wife. And Cassie’s sister.” I will always live in the shadow of her ghost. Rowan’s expression changes from shock to concern. “Wife?” He raises a brow at Callum. He shakes his head and starts walking to the gate. Not a term of endearment they both say wife as if I am a disease. You are a disease Shannon. Look at all the things you have done. There is no cure for what I carry.

  “Yes wife Rowan. We can fill in the blanks later.” They leave the knife and pictures on her grave and we leave. Avery clings to her father’s hand and her pigtails bounce as she walks to keep up with him. She keeps glancing back at Callum and me with a big smile. He just became her hero, what a terrible hero to have.

  LAURI LEFT ME A LETTER. She knew he was going to kill her. I wasn’t here to save her. I could have saved her!

  Dear Callum,

  Firstly where the fuck are you? You are the only person who stood a chance of stopping this and you weren’t here.

  I forgive you. I know you’re wrestling your own demons and you wouldn’t leave here unless you had no other choice. This is going to kill him Callum, I need you to remind him how to live. I need you to make sure he looks after our baby. We named her after your mum. Rowan chose the name the day he found out it was a little girl. He misses you, he has no one to guide him when he is lost anymore. You were always his anchor Callum he needs you.

  I needed you, now I want you to help him heal. You left him in his darkest hour and he may never forgive you, but he will still need you.

  I have some truths to confess to you before I go. I have numbers in my heart now too. Rowan helped me set my darkness free, he let me embrace everything I am. He sets my soul free by showing me both sides of who we are. I have killed and I enjoyed doing it. I know you think I only saw the soft sweet goodness in you. I know who you are underneath that Callum, we cannot deny who we are. We can try find another that matches our darkness, but beware love cannot fix everything, but it can break anyone. Love in our world is the most dangerous thing we can do. Love will kill us, the wounds left by loving someone cannot heal. They bleed every single day. I hope you find your love Callum and I hope she can accept all of you. I hope you can bleed for each other.

  Callum, my child will not be weak, sheltered or saved from this life. She must be strong and embrace who we are. I don’t want her to suffer at the hand of a monster, rather make her the monster she will need to be to survive. Rowan will never survive this alone.

  Please Callum, come home and love my family like you loved me and Rowan.

  Goodbye Sweets

  X

  Lauri

  Her small neat writing ripped my insides to shreds; the guilt of going home to take care of my life when I could have saved hers swallows me up. The guilt and the rage are all I can feel.

  As we walk back from the small graveyard where Mick and now Lauri are buried the words of her letter crush the last little bit of my soul. She needed me, he needed me and I wasn’t here. I was there killing them so I could be set free. I will never be set free. I love them all so much it aches all over.

  The little girl, I came home to steal, has already taken my breath away, she is so beautiful her eyes are haunting and almost frightening. She belongs to us. I will rather die than let her get hurt, I am already viciously protective of her. I don’t understand it, but the smile of that little angel has just given me hope. Hope is dangerous Callum, hope is not for us. Hope brought you Shannon and look how that worked out. Stay away from hope!

  AS I CRY OVER THE GRAVE of the only person I have ever loved, the same as I do every Sunday. Avery swings in the tree and ‘talks to mommy’, sometimes I wonder if she sees Lauri’s ghost here. The wind rustles the green leaves in the trees that tower over this sacred space. My heart still aches for her, my body misses her touch and my mind plays the memories over and over again. It is like torture waking each day knowing she is gone. “I miss you so much.”

  The saying goes better to have loved and lost – bullshit! The pain, of losing her, is far worse than the emptiness of loving nothing. Every time I see my little girl I am reminded of what I had, I didn’t save her. I didn’t keep her safe and now I have to live with the ghosts of my guilt. Avery will be four in just over a month. Four years without her feels like a lifetime.

  I only ever feel a little peace here, this place where we can come and talk to her and pretend for just a small while that she is here with us. Not even the pain of Robin’s needles can take away the ache I feel for her anymore I have no skin left to colour my ugly away.

  Avery’s swing slows down and I look up to see the face of another ghost. Callum falls to his knees next to me and pulls me into his arms. Where have you been? I can see his tears too, he cries with me for a while. “I am so sorry.” He chants over and over again. He loved her too, a different love, but he loved her none the less.

  He lets the contents of the envelope he holds fall on the grass between us, a bloody knife and a picture of Renzo Baldini’s dead body lay between us. I know Callum killed him, he did what I couldn’t. He set her free. He did it for me, for my baby and for his sins.

  I don’t have a family other than Avery, but he truly is my brother. We stay there for a while, there is nothing to say. He killed the man that stole the love of my life. He also murdered my father, I think this was his way of making so many wrongs right between us.

  We stand up and Avery darts between us, she sees the photos and the knife. I don’t stop her, she will never be sheltered from who we are. She beams a smile up at Callum. “You killed the devil.” She says sweetly like seeing a dead man doesn’t matter at all. “Yes he did baby, yes he did… Come let’s go home.”

  I turn to walk back and I am faced with yet another ghost, they are everywhere today. Cassie is standing in front of me. “Cassie?” My chest tightens with years of the guilt and the ache of the child I never loved.

  Callum answers something about a sister and a wife. “Wife?” Callum has a wife. That is not a good idea if I ever heard one. He will fucking kill her, no woman could last every night with what he does to them. I don’t like her, something is off and I can sense it a mile away, that woman is trouble. No, not trouble – evil. Not just evil, death I can smell it on her.

  My mind and heart are overflowing with feelings as we return to the estate house. Something feels right for the first time in four years. Callum is home and it seems like the clock has started working again and time is moving forward.

  THE SILENT PEACE THAT SETTLES over me when my friend embraces me in his arms confirms that I am finally home. I have missed this place so very much, four years away feels li
ke an eternity to me.

  As we get close to the steps at the back of Rowan’s house, a woman with mousy brown hair and soft dark eyes descends the steps towards us. I haven’t seen her before and when our eyes meet I see a softness that doesn’t belong in our world. Avery runs to meet her with a huge smile lighting her face. The woman’s eyes glint and her soft smile widens as the little girls arms wrap around her legs. She bends down and picks Avery up into a hug before she leads her up the steps and into the house.

  “Who is that Rowan?” I ask who the angelic looking woman, that just took his daughter inside, is. “Who? Morgan, she is Avery’s nanny and teacher. She lives here and helps me out.” He says it like she belongs like she isn’t sticking out amongst us and all our shit.

  The first thing in my head is a jealous tick and the hope that she isn’t helping him out. The silly notion is very swiftly replaced by a head shake as we enter the house. It is precisely as it was before, nothing has changed except there is no smell of real food wafting through the house. The stifling muggy heat of the valley is stuck inside and the air is stagnant and hard to breath.

  I sit down in the lounge where the memories of Lauri make my chest tight with sadness, this is the first time I have ever felt grief over someone’s death. Her not being here is gloomy and unexpected. I wanted to come home to the way it was before. I wanted happy, me and my wife and all should be right with the world.

  Nothing is right with the world, Lauri is gone, Shannon has killed me and my friend is only a small part of the man I left behind. Shannon sits next to me, she is sore and uncomfortable I can tell, but I don’t care when she reaches for my hand I pull it away. I cannot damp the raging fire of fury that she has ignited with her betrayal. I love her, but I cannot come back from this place. “So a wife.” Rowan interrupts my racing mind. When I am silent too long, Shannon answers him. Her silky lying voice is like nails on a chalkboard to my breaking heart.

  “Yes, we are married. I am, I mean was Cassie’s sister and I worked for Connor and Neil. I am a doctor.” She shifts a little her ass is no doubt painful right now. Rowan looks at her with judgmental eyes, as he does anyone entering our small bubble. He doesn’t like her, the twitch in his neck gives him away that and the tapping foot. Good instinct my friend, I plan to get rid of her soon. “Where the fuck have you been Callum? Your sister wouldn’t even tell me anything, she said I was safer knowing nothing.”

  He doesn’t know, he doesn’t know any of it. Shannon talks first again. “Callum was in an unfortunate work accident and was in a coma for twenty months Rowan, his family…” I cut her off before she says anymore.

  “I went home to get rid of the rot in my family Rowan, all of it. I eliminated them all. When it got to the end and I killed Neil, I was double crossed by Sahib. He put me in a coma. If I had of known, I would have come home. I swear I would have been right here with you. I would have killed Renzo long ago. I never would have left if I had even thought this would happen.” I take a breath and look away the tears watering in his eyes are like a knife in my chest. “I am so sorry, I am home now. You and me we can have a proper talk later over whiskey in your office. I want to take Shannon home then I will be back later.”

  I see her face fall when she realises I plan on leaving her alone. I am not ready to face her. I don’t want to be near her. I want to kill her.

  I want to tell him what she has done and I cannot do that if she is here. I need to take her away from here, I don’t trust her near Avery either. She needs a kill so badly that I don’t trust her near anyone I care about. She will be a danger to any person that strays into her line of sight until she has killed someone.

  Rowan reads me like a book, he knows me better than anyone else. He’s cold and dismissive towards Shannon and I can sense his instant dislike. “I will see you another day Shannon. It was a pleasure to meet you.” He stands and leaves us alone in the room. Her lip trembles like she wants to cry, I know she won’t she hates crying. When her green eyes find mine, I can see that I am breaking her. Only now it doesn’t hurt me. Only her. I will win, I always win.

  “Let’s go Shannon, I will come back later on. I can’t do this with you here today.” I am short with her and she scrambles to stand hissing as I rest my hand on her raw back. Our stand-off is broken by giggles and Avery bounding into the kitchen followed by Morgan, who laughs with her. They are light and seem to be untouched by the dark things around them in that brief second. I am distracted by their happiness and I want to be closer to it, part of it. Shannon’s face shows her dislike for children and happy things. We need to leave, I cannot trust her.

  I start to walk to the front door when Avery pipes loudly “Bye Uncle Callum, thank you for killing my devil.”

  A simple thank you from a little girl is all it takes to melt my heart of stone and make me feel good for just a minute.

  We drive back to Table View in silence; I look forward to going home to my apartment. My space and things, home at fucking last. The shadow of my family is gone and I can just live. The only shadow, I have now, is the shadow of death I fell in love with and married.

  She can sense the change in me. I can feel the distance that has settled between us. She might as well be back in Ireland. She would be closer than what I feel right now.

  I KNEW THE FIRST TIME I looked into Callum’s eyes he would kill me. I knew that nothing good could ever come from me trying to love anyone, I attempted to love him. I think I do love him. The rage contained in us I just too much and too powerful. We are in an impossible tug-of-war and no one can win. I know I have killed him already he just needs to die; watching him die will hurt me. It will break me, but not watching would mean I was already broken and I refuse to believe that I didn’t want to do this.

  Love is merely a madness. A sickness that should be overcome with the right treatment. I need to start treating my heart. Something has shifted inside him, the way he was last night and today is different, darker and far more dangerous than before. He was … deadly. I think he knows that I have murdered him, I think his sister told him. He hasn’t changed back from being the monster, his hands are fisted closed and his jaw is tight with a festering rage waiting to burst free. Waiting to kill me. He is going to kill me, quickly or slowly it doesn’t matter because it will be him taking me to my grave. I allow myself some more time for denial he hasn’t said anything about knowing.

  I want to ask him what has changed, but I am afraid I know the answer. He hums with subtle rage that is just below the cold façade he has worn all morning. I am genuinely scared of what I saw in that graveyard today, I am not welcome here. I am an outsider, alone again. No one will miss me because no one loves me.

  Love has broken me. I can’t un-love him. I cannot go back home, I have nothing left but my madness and he is taking that away from me too. He has stolen everything from me, I have nothing left. I am empty, but worse I am scared.

  I breathe in the air-conditioned air of his clean, modern apartment high above the ground. The giant windows overlook the ocean and the clear blue sky of the horizon. I can see the island where they kept their political prisoners in the bay. The skyline is dotted with ships coming into the port or waiting their turn. I can see the beauty he spoke of so often, but beautiful things are almost always ugly underneath it all and I have no doubt that Cape Town will be the same. There is an ominous dirty darkness lurking around the corners here. I can see the mountain in the distance its landmark flat top towering over the city.

  I know I will have to turn around and face him, I just don’t want to yet. I want to see the beauty for a minute more. When I look at him, all I see is what I have done, and all I feel is guilt because I am not really sorry, and I should be.

  When I do turn around Callum stares at the same view that I do, his eyes are empty and I cannot tell what he is thinking. I cannot make him feel if I can’t read him first. I am fucked. Like any game, you have an advantage when you play at home, and love is no different. I cannot manipulate mys
elf out of whatever this is.

  “What’s wrong Callum? Something is different, you’re different. I am afraid of you now.” I finally open my mouth and speak. He instantly tenses at the sound of my voice, the calm is replaced by a fury of emotion that I don’t recognise. He moves into my personal space and my body recoils, a protection instinct after the pain of last night. He still comes closer ignoring the physical clue that I am afraid of him. Pain still holds me hostage in my body he, brutalized me last night. The worst part of it was that my body reacted to it, my body enjoyed it while my mind screamed not to.

  His hand grips my throat and I am fighting for air again. “What’s wrong Shannon? I am not ready to even begin to start answering that question so you can sit here and stew over it. I am not prepared to deal with you yet. But when I am you will know all about it. Princess. You and your poisonous lies can wait until I am ready.” His venomous words and crushing grip make me twitch with fear. “You don’t get to go anywhere, you stay here. I will be back when I am ready to face you. I haven’t decided what to do with you yet! Shannon, cancer fucking cancer, you cowardly whore!” He slaps my cheek and it stings with the pain of the truth.

  He lets me go and the air burns as I suck it down in gulps trying to stay conscious. He walks back out of the door and I hear it locking from the outside, I am too far up for there to be another way out. I am alone, all alone again only this time I am sure I will die and no one will look for me.